Hello everyone! Doing my civic duty here, and inserting a great public service message on behalf of our friends at Cleanit Greenit Composting System Inc. and the City of Edmonton Reuse Center. Please note that funds raised will go to charity!

Marco, Kirstin, and Karo Castro-Wunsch and all our volunteers, are hosting a fun event to show there is beauty in waste and recyclables and if the community could just see it, maybe we would throw out less. The event is on October 11, 2014 in the new McKernan community hall (11341-78 Ave.). Artists are donating pieces of art made from waste and recyclables to bring awareness about the stuff we throw out every day that is reusable, recyclable, and that doesn’t compost. Proceeds go to “Renacimiento Verde” an environmental stewardship grant program for school kids in Mexico.So come out and wonder at the extraordinary scope of objects considered waste and make promises to yourself to reduce your impact. Fall in love with a work and bid on it!Evening includes wine, tapas, music, multimedia shows, fun activities, all environmentally themed for $50 per ticket. Join us for some environmental fun!Main sponsors are Cleanit Greenit Composting System Inc. and The City of Edmonton Reuse Center.The Castro-Wunsch’s have been operating Cleanit Greenit Composting System in Edmonton since 1998, and have seen a lot of uncompostables come through the site. This got them thinking, and now our whole volunteer environmental team is thinking about waste too. We want to give you an evening to think environment too while having a little fun. We sincerely invite you to join us for this fun, fun evening to fight back and rethink waste.Please donate by buying tickets, and maybe some art, so our school kids in Mexico can earn school grants by doing sustainability projects. If you are unavailable on October 11 please donate anyway and we will give your tickets in your name to artists or persons who want to come but cannot buy a ticket.Please pass this on to a friend who might be interested or even get an association to circulate it. Please come out and bring a couple like minded friends.

Edmonton Commercial Real Estate - Dumb Money or Smart Money?

The current edition has a front page article entitled "Invest wisely: don't follow the "dumb" money". Now I don't know about you, but a headline like that sure caught my attention. I think the headline is pretty self-explanatory so I will get straight to the point after this quote from the article. Speaking of the frenzy around income trusts in 2007 and Finance Minister Flaherty's tax amendment blocking the loophole, he says "Yet even before Mr. Flaherty's move, I knew the sector was ready for a hit. I'd been tracking the inflow of capital by retail investors, the so-called "dumb money" (if you're a retail investor, how do you feel now?) into new issues, as well as into mutual funds holding income trusts. So when I saw money pile into income trusts, I knew the good times would soon be over. As a result, I cashed out, thereby saving my investors a lot of grief."

I love the next line; "Still is it really fair to call investors who follow the crowd dumb? In a word, yes. Not only are they usually the last to get into a particular sector, they're usually the last to get out as well."

Well.

Remember he said that, not me. But my next question is the million dollar question (literally). Is investing in Edmonton now "following the dumb money". Well I think that I'd be pretty dumb to say yes to that question in public, but honestly I don't think so. I think investing in Edmonton is still pretty smart. But....I think the small investor does need to be careful. Let's talk about this. Firstly,

We can analyze economics to death and produce flashy full colour charts, spreadsheets and prognostications, but really, one thing tells me more than all the analyses in the world...where is the big money going? The big money is more likely to be the smart money than us little guys' miniscule forays into the world of commercial real estate. I'm talking players who invest in the hundreds of millions of dollars. And the good news is that a lot of that money is flowing into Edmonton. If Edmonton is good enough for the big boys, it's good enough for me.

So I'm safe to plunge all my money into Edmonton?

Well I wouldn't go that far. There are a small but growing number of institutional investors becoming wary of investing in Edmonton and that is understandable. Valuations are growing, rents are increasing, and new projects are underway every day. So small investors need to be wary in this kind of market. A hot market brings a lot of speculators and a lot of unsavoury individuals. Yes, things are going up and up. And what goes up....

Well you'll just have to wait (not long) for my next blog post to find out. I will discuss the boring details behind what my thoughts are for Edmonton real estate in the coming few years.